3/20/2024 0 Comments 2008 election results nytimes![]() ![]() There were signs of this in 2004 when older groups gave Republican George W. One possible explanation is that the older voters of 2008 were more attached to the Republican Party than were the preceding birth cohorts of the aged (for a broader discussion of age, cohort, and period effects in presidential elections, see Frenk, 2008). But in 2008, factors other than old-age policy issues-in particular, older voters’ partisan leanings, the candidates’ contrasting ages, and the candidates’ contrasting racial identities-shed some light on why McCain received distinctive majorities from various cohorts of older voters. ![]() And even when such issues have been prominent in presidential campaigns over the past four decades, there has been no credible evidence that older persons have responded to them as an issue voting bloc (see Campbell, 2005 Street, 1999). The 2008 E/M poll did not ask questions about old-age policy issues, which were not especially prominent in the election campaign. The data were obtained by the author directly from E/M and from compilations from the E/M poll, which were undertaken and published by various media. These data are from the 2008 national Election Day exit poll conducted by Edison Media Research and Mitofsky International (herein after referred to as the E/M poll), which was financed by television networks, and major newspapers and magazines. This brief report presents data that help illuminate why older voters voted more heavily for McCain. Voters aged 45–59 years gave the Republican 49%, voters aged 30–44 years gave him 46%, and voters aged 18–29 years gave him just 32% ( New York Times). Older voters were the only age-group to give a majority to McCain. Among voters aged 65 years and older, McCain was favored even more he received 53% of their votes compared with Obama's 45% ( MSNBC, 2008). Yet, persons aged 60 years and older gave 51% of their votes to McCain and 47% to Obama. It was only the second time in the last 10 presidential elections-spanning 37 years-that older voters failed to vote for the winner and did not distribute their votes among the candidates in roughly the same proportions as the electorate as a whole ( New York Times, 2008).Īmong all voters, Barack Obama beat McCain by a margin of 53%–46% ( New York Times, 2008). In the 2008 presidential election, a majority of older persons voted for the loser, John McCain. In July 2008, the prominent political consultant Mark Penn (2008) proclaimed, “America as a nation has never been older and the power of the senior vote has never been greater.” But he was wrong. Implications: In the study of age-group voting behavior, ongoing attention is needed to cohort and period effects, as well as candidates’ contrasting individual characteristics-in addition to possible effects of campaign issues.Īge-group voting, Elections, Politics of aging, Voting behavior Race may have been a factor, although all groups of White voters aged 30 years and older gave McCain a substantial majority, whereas the youngest cohort of Whites, aged 18–29 years, favored Obama. Positive self-identification with the 72-year -old McCain by voters aged 65–74 years seems to have been another factor, although there was no indication of such age identification among those aged 60–64 years and 75 years and older. Results: Republican leanings of the Eisenhower birth cohort that is presently among those aged 65 years and older were a factor, whereas the immediately succeeding younger cohorts did not manifest the same partisan predilection. Methods: Analysis was undertaken by mining raw data from the 2008 Edison–Mitofsky national Election Day exit poll, as well as compilations from that poll that were published by various media that finance it. The purposes of this report are to help illuminate why older voters were the only age-group that gave a majority to McCain and to delineate some ongoing issues in the analysis of older persons’ voting behavior. Purpose: In the 2008 presidential election, a majority of older persons voted for John McCain, the loser. ![]()
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